266. What’s Your Spiritual Story: Abigail's Confessions on Childhood, Time, and Spiritual Awakening

266. What’s Your Spiritual Story: Abigail's Confessions on Childhood, Time, and Spiritual Awakening

Author: Jerry L. Martin January 15, 2026 Duration: 1:13:00

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In this special edition of What’s Your Spiritual Story?, philosopher Abigail Rosenthal sits down with her husband, Jerry L. Martin, for the most extended and personal telling of her spiritual story to date.

Drawing on her memoir, Confessions of a Young Philosopher, Abigail traces the formation of her inner life from an Edenic childhood and early encounters with loss, to adolescent philosophical crisis, homesickness, and the search for a reality that could withstand time, absence, and illusion.

Along the way, she reflects on formative influences, including Thomas Mann’s Joseph novels, Homer’s Odyssey, Gandhi, existentialism, political idealism, and the dangers of moral absolutism and ideological guilt.

This conversation explores themes of time and impermanence, spiritual longing, innocence and disillusionment, femininity and intellectual life, and what it means to test ideas by living them.

Abigail recounts her experiences in Paris, London, and the American academy, examining how philosophy, spirituality, and personal history intersect—and sometimes collide—in a woman’s life.

Rather than offering tidy conclusions, this episode presents a lived spiritual journey: one shaped by curiosity, risk, error, and hard-won clarity. It is a story about becoming—not only a philosopher, but a person capable of resisting illusion while remaining open to meaning.

Other Series:

The podcast began with the Dramatic Adaptation of the book and now has several series:

The Life Wisdom Project – Spiritual insights on living a wiser, more meaningful life.

From God to Jerry to You – Divine messages and breakthroughs for seekers.

Two Philosophers Wrestle With God – A dialogue on God, truth, and reason.

Jerry & Abigail: An Intimate Dialogue – Love, faith, and divine presence in partnership.

What’s Your Spiritual Story – Real stories of people changed by encounters with God.

What’s On Our Mind – Reflections from Jerry and Scott on recent episodes.

What’s On Your Mind – Listener questions, divine answers, and open dialogue. 

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Imagine a philosopher, a dedicated scholar who spent his life in the realm of ideas without a trace of faith, suddenly finding himself in a dialogue he never sought. GOD: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher-The Podcast is the unfolding account of Dr. Jerry L. Martin, a lifelong agnostic and former head of the National Endowment for the Humanities, who one day offered a prayer and received a clear, verbal response. This isn't a theoretical exercise or a sermon; it's a personal chronicle of what happened next, as a trained thinker with deep skepticism began asking the big questions about existence, purpose, and human nature, and recorded the answers he received. Each episode moves this extraordinary narrative forward, blending the disciplines of philosophy, spirituality, and raw personal experience. You'll hear Dr. Martin's thoughtful reflections on these conversations, which span topics from the nature of the divine to the practical challenges of living an ethical life, all grounded in his academic background. This podcast invites you into a story that challenges preconceptions, not to persuade but to present a profound and documented experience. It's for anyone curious about the intersection of intellect and the ineffable, where a philosopher's quest for truth took an utterly unexpected turn. The journey detailed here resonates across categories of religion, culture, and society, offering a unique perspective that is both deeply human and mysteriously transcendent.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 278

GOD: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philosopher - The Podcast
Podcast Episodes
268. From God to Jerry to You: How God Speaks Across Religions [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 31:00
Questions? Comments? Text Us!Can God speak through more than one religion?In this episode of From God to Jerry to You, philosopher Jerry L. Martin explores a central insight from God: An Autobiography, As Told to a Philo…
265. Radically Personal – William James on Religious Experience [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 18:18
Questions? Comments? Text Us!In this episode of Radically Personal, Jerry L. Martin turns to the work of American philosopher and psychologist William James to explore how divine reality is encountered in lived experienc…
264. Jerry & Abigail: An Intimate Dialogue- Evil, Love, and God [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:07:00
Questions? Comments? Text Us!In this year-end intimate dialogue, philosophers Jerry L. Martin and Abigail L. Rosenthal return to one of the most enduring questions in philosophy and theology: why evil persists, and what…